Another thought: I really think this game would benefit from the maps being split into specific "rooms," similar to Binding of Isaac. Some of the rooms would be the same size as the game window, and some would be larger and thus require panning (again, similar to binding of isaac). Whenever you cross over into another room, the camera would rapidly pan to the new room.
The game world would still be all one contiguous piece, but I think that splitting things up with the camera would help with the cohesion of the world. It would allow me to more clearly delineate which areas of the world are different from each other; perhaps some rooms could be "challenge rooms," where you have to do a platforming challenge or a puzzle to get a clearly visible "coin." (It's becoming more and more clear that this game needs collectables.) It's also nice for the camera to remain static for longer periods of time, because then you get to see the art more clearly.